I could tell, just from Prince William’s reaction, that The Princes and the Press was going to be good. William did what any ill-tempered, short-sighted, squirrelly dumbass would do in his situation: he Streisand-Effected the program which he didn’t want anyone to watch. He roped Clarence House and Buckingham Palace into his drama and he tried to make it sound like all of his nasty, contemptuous actions belonged to Harry. The Princes and the Press is basically a series of probing interviews – conducted by Amol Rajan – with Royal Rota journalists. Rajan pleasantly gives them enough rope to hang themselves and the monarchy. As the Guardian summed up:
Ultimately, Rajan’s programme eloquently if unwittingly made the case for the republicanism he once overtly espoused. Royal journalism, as he showed it in action, does the opposite of exciting reverence: rather, it places its hand gently on the backs of Britons’ heads and pushes our noses deep into the royal family’s dirty linen. Everybody involved gets degraded by it.
The stories and insights within The Princes and the Press are nothing new to long-time royal watchers, nor is any of this shocking if you listened to Harry’s words in the Oprah interview and The Me You Can’t See. Harry spoke openly about the invisible contract with the press, about the generational trauma he was expected to endure and inflict on his own children. Meghan’s lawyer was actually interviewed in the documentary, and you’ll never guess who latched onto that fact as some kind of proof that the documentary is pro-Sussex propaganda. Yes, now that Part 1 of the program has aired, Kensington Palace, Clarence House and Buckingham Palace are all throwing a tantrum:
The BBC was accused of giving credibility to ‘overblown and unfounded claims’ about the Royal Family last night as it broadcast a controversial documentary about William and Harry. In an extraordinary joint statement, Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace and Clarence House said it was ‘disappointing’ that the broadcaster had chosen to air allegations surrounding Harry and Meghan’s departure from Britain.
Lawyers for the Royal Family were on standby over the two-part BBC2 series, which included claims that insiders from other royal households had briefed against the Sussexes. Buckingham Palace has reportedly threatened a boycott on future projects with the BBC after courtiers were not allowed to view the programme before the first episode was aired last night.
In the strongly-worded joint statement given to the BBC ahead of last night’s programme, representatives for the Queen, Prince Charles and Prince William said: ‘A free, responsible and open Press is of vital importance to a healthy democracy. However, too often overblown and unfounded claims from unnamed sources are presented as facts and it is disappointing when anyone, including the BBC, gives them credibility.’
Last night’s first episode of The Princes and The Press detailed media coverage of the young royals from 2012 to 2018, when Harry and Meghan became engaged. It included claims of ‘competitiveness’ between the different royal households.
Journalist Omid Scobie, co-author of the controversial biography of the Sussexes, Finding Freedom, said negative stories had been leaked about Meghan, although he did not name those involved. ‘There were some people who felt she [Meghan] needed to be put in her place. I think by leaking a negative story, that’s punishment. There’s been rumours for quite some time that a lot of the most damaging and negative stories… have come from other royal households or from other royal aides. From my own research and reporting that’s exactly true.’
“However, too often overblown and unfounded claims from unnamed sources are presented as facts…” What is this even in reference to? Is the joint statement saying that The Princes and the Press is full of unnamed sources presenting unfounded claims as facts? Or is that exactly what the Royal Rota journalists have done when they use unnamed sources, senior palace aides and “sources close to William” in the years-long character assassination of an American woman?
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid and WENN.
Haven’t seen it yet, but I hope it sheds a big spotlight on the vipers nest – sunlight is a good disinfectant. #AbolishTheMonarchy
I hope I can see it.
One thing really puzzles me. There is no mention of this programme in the Daily Mail at all today.
They boycotted it!
It makes sense, since they have strongest relationship with the Royal Family. But still it shocks me.
The dailymail ran a article last night. Stroll to dailymail uk royal news, the commenters were split on good show, and defundd the bbc.
Part 2 of the programme is tonight but I won’t watch it as there is usually a sting in the tail when it comes to the royals. The BBC can’t be trusted sadly.
Agree. I’m good with being wrong if after part 2 shows that. I was disappointed when I watched Epstein’s Shadow: Ghislaine Maxwell. It seemed liked the last few episodes involved Anna Pasternak explaining away Ghislaine’s actions and portraying her as a victim. Plus, there are very few in the British Media that haven’t shown Harry & Meghan positively. “invisible contract” From what I’ve read did part 1 really show Will in the royal family in a negative light or did it only confirm some things out there already? Kate using her hair to hide her face? Is that suppose to be some kind of great & shocking reveal? Will being ‘work shy’ isn’t a big reveal. Saying Harry was the more popular than Will is true. Did they talk about how maybe they weren’t ripping on Harry because he was serving 2 tours? in Afghanistan? The Vegas stuff was in 2012. The press milked that out. Will & Kate’s laziness has been for a long time.
Amol & Wootton have a professional/personal? relationship. Rajan had Mr. Rotten on his podcast in Jan. 2020. Maybe it’s my ears alone but it seemed like Dan fumbled his answer a bit about how he received the news from a source regarding the Duke & Duchess of Sussex stepping down. He said he received a message on Facebook.LOL Rotten also complained about Bryony Gordon. Rajan did defend-I’ll give him credit for that. Around the 55 sec mark Rajan introduces DW. Then you can skip about the 11:10 mark (there is a lot of convo about Brit Box before that)
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/20-the-media-show-61332005/episode/a-right-royal-pr-disaster-61348884/
The lady doth protest much, in a few years time we will probably know exactly what happened, they’re getting warmer.
Yes they are 😒
As I have noticed with most British media, I expect the second part will be a nonstop attack on Harry and Meghan. I don’t expect any journalistic integrity from them.
BBC is firmly pro monarchy. Since they will never get access to Harry and Meghan, the monarchy is all they have. They will never attack it. Let’s not forget the bbc attacked Lili and one of their employees attacked Archie. They are pretending to be fair before they go in for the kill.
I will add that I respect that Harry and Meghan put out statements with their full names attached. We see that here with Meghan’s lawyer or in other instances with statements from their spokesperson or in interviews they do. There are no unnamed sources or anonymous friends speaking on their behalf that the British media like to pretend. That’s the difference between Harry and Meghan compared to the three other palaces.
That’s my thinking too. I don’ trust them and they are just luring us like spiders drawing us to their web.
I think so too but I also think that the media is getting tired of losing money watching the biggest media market in the world benefit from covering the Sussexes. The relationship with the royals and BM is not a strong one. No matter how much saccharine coverage they give them. You can tell it’s holding on by a string.
I don’t think it will be anti Sussex. It may not be pro Sussex either. I think it might just call them out on a couple of things, as it did in part one.
The documentary was interesting, in that it was surprisingly unbiased, and took shots at William and Kate, as equally as it did with the Sussex’s, if not more so.
Perhaps what’s happening here is actually payback for the royals lack of access in recent times, and the misleading stories surrounding the Queen. It’s almost as though they’ve given up, and now want to report in their own way. The very fact that they had Meghan’s lawyer there at the end of the interview was interesting. No direct representatives for the Cambridges were invited to take part, as far as we are aware.
Still, I guess we will see what happens in part two.
@Brit said:
“I also think that the media is getting tired of losing money watching the biggest media market in the world benefit from covering the Sussexes.”
I totally agree with this @Brit. This is it, in a nutshell. It’s all about money and exploitation. The firm and the rota never bargained for completely losing Harry. Variably, they all thought it would be possible to give Meghan hell and possibly to push her out. But it was more-so Will’s KP crew who truly had it in for Meghan.
I laughed at the parts in the documentary when many of the rota talking heads whined about not having any access to Meghan after the engagement, and after the royal wedding. The rota ratchets even had the nerve to b*tch about how they were separated from the golden couple by the pond, at KP sunken gardens during the engagement photoshoot! LOL!
Of course Wootton and the rest of the rota are lying (as usual) when they try to claim that they would have written nicer stories had they been given access. They wrote vile stories about Meghan from the very beginning of learning about the M&H courtship. And that’s even inadvertently noted in the first part of the documentary when some of the headlines in the tabloids are discussed. It was these nasty tabloid headlines which precipitated Harry’s November 2016 press statement warning the rota to back-off from harassing his girlfriend.
While some truths and some half-truths, as well as the usual lies are told in this documentary, there are also still plenty of sly digs at Meghan (in particular the rehashing of the debunked ‘tiaragate’ story). As @Kaiser notes, most of us who have closely followed the M&H saga already know what went down, backwards and forwards. So hardly any of this is really new information. It’s just a slightly different tack the British media is attempting to take, perhaps an indication of opening salvos foreshadowing intentions to write more critical stories about the Cambridges, especially once QE-II finally passes.
After all, the salty British slag heap that is the rota and the firm, have nowhere to go. They are hoist by their own petard. As you indicate, the gig is up, and it has been for sometime. The charismatic couple with the magical aura, escaped the gilded cage nearly two years ago. M&H done dropped the mike, netted money deals, built Archewell and established collaborative partnerships, bought their forever home, had their second child, and are thriving in Montecito with their rescue chickens, their lovely dogs, and their beautiful children. They ain’t never going back.
This realization is finally fully dawning on the carnival clowns and the grey men. Much of the rota’s rehashing, chest-beating and projecting blame away from themselves, that we see in this documentary, may also portend a dog-eat-dog battle between rota & palaces, which might upend or significantly alter the ‘invisible contract.’
@GraceB said:
“No direct representatives for the Cambridges were invited to take part.”
Huh? Maybe that’s because many of the rota talking heads in the documentary have been in cahoots with KP, and thus essentially ‘represent’ the Cambridges, especially woeful Wootton, slimy Tominey (who revealed her son’s name is ‘Harry’ LOL), and smarmy Jobba Jobson (who is chiefly in Charles’ camp). :popcorn:
Exactly this. When there are stories which are are actually a bad look for the monarchy like Andrew having a loan paid off by a Tory donor or Charles cash for access scandals, the rota ignores it. whereas they are amplifying this. The palace’s statement is just another way to add controversy to make people interested & to distance the palace from whatever hit job in part 2 of the series.
The palace complaining about rumours& unnamed sources is such a joke – I know the person who issued the statement was laughing. But anyway also way to prove what could have been done for Meghan if they weren’t actually behind the smears.
Not watching but interested to learn that Meghan’s lawyer is denying the bullying claims openly. She’s not going to take that smear lying down. Wonder what the firm is gonna do about the fake investigation.
Ignoring Andrew being a nonce is them realizing it doesn’t sell papers. I’m not watching the documentary, but I do think that showing how they brief against H&M is making them look petty and ridiculous when they refuse to speak on Nonce Andrew. Whatever, their behaviors are pushing for the republic!!
@Lurker, the thing is, they need the BBC more than the BBC needs them. It’s making them look asinine to keep “threatening” to boycott them when that really isn’t a feasible option for the royal family. So maybe the BBC is starting to run out of fcks about what the Windsors think.
@lurk this was my thinking too yesterday and after part 1 I’m happy to be wrong though I feel like they weren’t clear enough in pointing the finger at William lol. It left the viewer to connect the dots.
With that said part 2 comes out next week and I’m not holding my breathe that it will be fair to Harry and Meghan. I hope it is but as you said these people have not been kind to the Sussex family why should we expect it now. But I hope come next week I’m wrong and this begins the process of someone out there finally calling out/fully investigating/documentary of the royal family/royal rota for their targeted harassment and bullying of Harry and Meghan
@Lurker8. BBC is “pretending to be fair before they go in for the kill.” I so agree with you. It’s all drama.
Really!! What happened to never complain never axplain?
It’s officially been retired… Going forward, they will be a lot of explaining and complaining 🙃
Not only that, they bothered to eke out a joint statement trying to defend themselves while Harry and Meghan were denied the right to correct the falsehoods against them. These hypocritical royals, their incompetent shady staff, and the rats can go to hell.
@Edith apparently that only applies to Harry.
The sheer AUDACITY of these vile people to say, “…too often overblown and unfounded claims from unnamed sources are presented as facts and it is disappointing when anyone, including the BBC, gives them credibility.’”
when all they’ve been doing for the past five YEARS was trashing Meghan via anonymous “palace sources” for with all of their leaks?!! It’s just incredible how arrogant they are, jfc.
We know they’re shameless, but do they also think that the peasants lack memories and will see immediately how hypocritical this is?!
I’m glad to read that Jenna Aziz the lawyer for Duchess Meghan gave an on the record reply against the lies. I will always applaud this openness by Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan to put their names in their dealings with the media.
Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan made the correct decision leaving the BRF to start a life of their own.. My heart breaks for Prince Harry past life in the BRF…their “love” for him was very conditional if they did love him. Thank goodness Meghan came into Prince Harry’s life at the right time when he was mentally strong to break the shackles that binds him. I really believe he couldn’t have freed himself without Meghan…Prince Harry needed a strong woman. And I deeply believe Meghan is the only woman that would or could achieved this freedom with him.
May Prince Harry, Duchess Meghan, Archie, Lilibeth and Doria continue to be blessed.
So glad the veil is being lifted and all and sundry can see the Windsors for who they really are. Now whether people actually DO anything about it, that’s another question.
This.
Also I am gobsmacked by the entitlement the Windsors have thinking they had a right to essentially edit this documentary.
They are living off the taxpayers. They should have absolutely no say when it comes to reporting on them, aside from offering their side of the story as should be anyone’s right. The British people deserve to know what they’re paying for.
They have got some sort of invisible power STRIPE, because I recall on the Scotland Covid choo choo tour, they were advised that Scotland was tightening up restrictions and the royals insisted that they make the trip regardless. They love to flaunt this control they seem to have and long for the days of Empire. This reminds me of how the Romanovs went down. Nicholas II was so oblivious to how the public perceived him and his family until it was too late.
The press has used the family’s hubris and jealously against them and they’re aren’t doing a damn thing to or about this documentary. They can’t. That media knows exactly what they’re doing by hyping it up. When Harry said William and his father were trapped, he was dead on. Those people only care about their bottom line and the rest of the royals are not cutting it. Even if a majority of this was filmed before the Oprah sit down, I doubt anything has changed except now they see their golden geese thriving and giving access to the American media. Both the BM and RF are reaching a breaking point, no matter how they try to throw Meghan and Harry under the bus. Eventually, all the media will turn on them to make up for what they’ve lost. It hasn’t reached that point yet but you can see it’s heading there.
So I had a thought as I read your comment and maybe it has been mentioned before; but maybe, just maybe, the BaRF is angry that H&M have exposed the ying/yang relationship they have with the media. This is all coming to light not only due to H&M but because in this day in age, with information being so ready available, we don’t get one side of the story. It is not media controlled. There is no more “gentleman’s agreement” (which I was told also took place in the US). Look at the racial injustices in the US, there are hand held cameras showing what the reality was of the situation – not what police want us to believe. The information we get has always been controlled, sometimes to forgo mass hysteria, and now we see examples and proof.
There are so many layers to why the BaRF are angry/upset with H&M and shedding light on the media and their relationship is a big one.
While I agree that shedding light on the inner workings of the relationship with the media is probably part of issue, I don’t think it’s true to say that issues aren’t media controlled anymore.
They still truly are. People might be out there with their camera’s recording incidents, but news outlets will be picky about what they show, to suit their own agenda. What they don’t cover would require someone to research for themselves, and then you have the issue with social media and false information. I’ve seen plenty of video’s supposedly as proof of an event, and it turns out that the video was from something else entirely.
The media still control much of the narrative and help to form public opinion. People choose which media they engage with, depending upon their own views, and the media use that to their advantage. It’s all biased in some way. There’s almost nowhere that simply report on the facts, without trying to twist it to sway opinion.
I think there was actual jealously more than anything. It’s always been known that the press and palace has a relationship. The problem is that now it’s backfired on all of them. Some in the palace may have wanted Meghan and Harry gone, even just Meghan but the problem now is that the press didn’t. She in particular made them too much money. So both the BM and RF are stuck. There’s a reason why they keep making a big fuss over Meghan and Harry returning. There’s pressure no doubt.
The program last night actually said that Harry sold more than William and that Harry was the new Diana. There was a point when they wouldn’t go after Harry because he was too popular, so they went ahead and called William work-shy, etc. I think those statements most likely enraged the Burger King because he does not want the public to remember that they liked Harry better than him.
Meghan is a catalyst. The problem has always been The fact that Harry is more charismatic, popular, and a more capable royal than William. Harry paired with a charismatic wife pushed William over the edge.
They can’t do anything about a boycott either. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.
They’re public figures and the BBC can have programs all about them morning, noon, and night without their cooperation as much as they please.
I will not watch it and the other parts, and I will only give my clicks to Celebitchy’s articles.
#ApologizeToMeghan #AbolishTheMonarchy
It was actually a lot more balanced than i thought after hearing who was taking part. I was surprised at how many of the different Household favourites appeared and if this would cause any issues in future. I think the press are generally sick of protecting the royals and i hope they truely turn on each other.
I watched it too and found it to be pretty measured. That might be down to the fact it only covered up until after the wedding. I really hope the BBC don’t pander to the the Royals and part 2 gets favourably edited. So far in reading over a few different comment sections from various news sources, there seems to be quite a lot more realisation that Harry and Meghan got a hard time because of the family feeding negativity to the media until they felt like they had to report on it. Roll on next Monday!
I think this is the BBC fighting back they probably weren’t happy with the fallout following Martin Bashir and William trying to control them & ordering them not to show Diana’s interview again. Then, just a few weeks ago the BBC royal reporters were upset because the palace hiding information about the queen’s health situation.
I like this theory.
@Demi, except the BBC fallout was May 2021. Omid Scobie clearly stated he was interviewed for this November 19, 2020. The fallout had not happened yet. The queen’s health situation didn’t factor into this series.
Exactly.
Wooten and Jobson were on telling two entirely different tales about the Tiara story and ended up looking like idiots.
Hmmm.. is this priming the powder for Part 2? Kaiser has often pointed out, and rightly so, that 2018 was the turning point in the press against Meghan. No doubt they’re going to get into the RR’s thoughts on the Oprah interview, and I wonder if the series managed to get interviews with US media outlets.
Would be absolutely BRILLIANT if Knauf appeared. But such are my pipe dreams.
It was filmed before the Oprah interview.
I thought it was pretty even-handed, considering that the vast majority of the reporters interviewed were not exactly objective. For those who couldn’t watch it on BBC, my takeaways were as follows:
1) Everyone interviewed confirmed the ‘invisible contract’, and that different households compete for attention, and that they have sources in the royal households even if they withheld their actual names, and that these sources leak with the permission of their principals, and that they deliberately set members of the family against each other in their coverage.
2) The princes both hate the press (Diana, hacking), and the reporters know they do and understand why they do, although William is able/prepared to hold his nose and work with them while Harry isn’t.
3) The royal reporters either can’t or won’t see the racism in what they do (with the exception, ironically, of the Prime Minister’s sister who says she now wouldn’t write about Meghan the way she did four years ago).
4) Camilla Tominey (?) really hates Meghan, and isn’t very good at hiding it.
5) Harry either deliberately or inadvertently didn’t prepare Meghan very well for dealing with this particular type of British media, and she did her best as her previous career had prepared her at least in part, but they punished her for it all the same.
Thanks much for the summary! With respect to No. 1 — does the RR pit the houses against each other, or do the sources within the RF do that deliberately due to the time honored Windsor tradition of implacable jealousy? Or a little of column A, a bit of column B until it’s a ruthless positive feedback cycle?
Both – the royal households will use other family members to deflect from themselves, and the royal reporters will use positive coverage and negative coverage as a way of rewarding good friendly overtures and punishing particular family members for perceived transgressions and slights against them. The reporters also said how annoying it was to be scooped on their stories about one family member by the actions of another, so that also creates resentment.
Thanks! This deeply enmeshed relationship between the RF and RR is so f-cked up.
“Harry either deliberately or inadvertently didn’t prepare Meghan very well for dealing with this particular type of British media, and she did her best as her previous career had prepared her at least in part, but they punished her for it all the same.”
I felt that while reading the other article on the Chelsey hacking but IDK if you can truly prepare someone for this illegal, underhanded nonsense.
I also don’t know if you can properly prepare someone for a fishbowl you’ve lived in since birth. Harry simply wasn’t the person to prepare Meg– he was too close to the situation and too used to the life to understand exactly what Meg would need to prepare. I think his life was just life to him and it would be difficult for him to know what someone outside the royal bubble would need to exist in it.
Meg needed someone more distanced and objective to give her the real scoop/warnings. But who would that be? And would Meg even listen? She seems kinda stubbornly optimistic and would probably feel like she could handle anything.
I think Harry knew the press would be a problem, but underestimated how big a problem it would be. I do think its hard, like you said, to properly prepare someone for something that’s just been a part of your life for the entirety of it. And I also think that something changed in Harry when Meghan and then Archie came into his life – he was “okay” with the press intrusion into his life, and he had long “accepted”* that he was the scapegoat, that the press was going to cover him differently than it did William – but he was not okay with Meghan being used like that, and certainly not Archie.
also, I just think he thought the palace would protect Meghan the way it protected Kate and her family. He didn’t realize the palace was going to use Meghan to keep embiggening Kate.
*”okay” and “accepted” being relative terms, since we know how much the press intrusion affected him, so I’m not saying he didn’t have a problem with it, just that it was something he was used to for himself but was not going to accept it for Meghan.
I think it’s a bit of both – obviously Harry has grown up this way and is used to it, but at the same time he saw what happened to Chelsea and Cressida, and he had his own phone hacked, so he knew what they were capable of. But he hates the press and is intransigent about dealing with them and that’s antagonistic because the reporters have no empathy, they simply want their stories and front pages. I get the sense that he thought he could keep them at a literal and figurative distance, and of course Meghan followed his lead in this, and over time that alienated them. They want the appearance of friendship, cosy chats, banter, cutesy anecdotes, photos of the kids etc. and if they don’t get them, they’ll turn nasty, and that makes Harry even more intransigent which in turn inspires even more nastiness. It’s a completely abusive relationship.
I resent that you frame Harry as a helpless victim, but Meghan as “stubbornly optimistic”. You think he was incapable of preparing her, yet if someone capable tried, she would have been incapable of listening? That’s pretty unfair. She gave up everything and followed Harry’s lead completely.
It could have been Kate, but Kate chose hate.
I really think that after what happened with Chelsea, he didn’t want to tell Meghan just how bad it could be because he didn’t want her to walk away. I don’t think it was very fair of him, but as the documentary pointed out, who would really want to sign up for that?
I also feel like Meghan probably had an image in her mind of what marrying a prince would be like, and when you’re in love and living in that moment, you tend to pick the information which supports that image, dismissing the rest. It’s almost like when women end up in abusive relationships. If they’re in love, they might dismiss or explain away the red flags, and hang onto the positives, or the friends who support their view. So even if there were warnings, they were probably pushed to one side.
How do you prepare someone for the unprecedented? The tabloids are vicious but nothing has been seen on this crazy scale before.
The amount of abused Meghan received as a senior royal was unprecedented. People who marry in tend to have whatever bad press they were getting/could have gotten brushed under the carpet in exchange for great press at best and okay press at worst with a few nicknames and gossip thrown in. Even with Kate, the “Waity Katie” stuff and the things with the Midds weren’t really covered after the wedding and they weren’t brought back until the press realised these two weren’t holding up their end of the bargain (working and showing pictures of the kids). And then stoped when they started working with the press.
Meghan had an entire smear campaign against her so I’m not sure how Harry was supposed to prepare her for that. And IMO it puts the blame on Harry/Meghan for not “learning” how to deal with the press instead of pointing fingers at the press for treating married-ins this way and the system that protects the heir over everyone else.
I think Meghan expected the press to be fair. If she swore at the Queen with the Rota present then she’d expect that would be blown up and reported. If she took a nose dive walking down the street at a meet and greet then she would expect to see that on the front pages. What she didn’t expect would be 12,000 articles about her touching her own body while pregnant, or damning articles about fueling terrorism by eating an avocado or helping out the Hub kitchen women. The Rota picked her apart like vultures for fun and money all the while the palace was mute when they could have asked the press to lay off. And it’s not just articles, it’s the talking heads on the morning shows all speaking negatively about her all the time. What they did to Meghan they had not done to Kate or Harry so how could anyone expect it?
Mariahlee- Harry is not a victim. Saying he probably isn’t the best to prepare Meg for royal life isn’t saying he’s a victim or helpledd. It’s just a truth that it’s tough to properly prepare someone for something you’ve gotten used to– no shame or blame if you’re incapable of properly conveying your own experience because you’re too close
As for “stubbornly optimistic”- there’s no need to get mad at that. It’s not a bad thing. Meg is a woman determined to look on the bright side. Nothing wrong with that. It doesn’t mean she’s incapable listening. Just that she might choose to ignore. That’s her agency at work and it’s fine. You yourself admit “she gave up everything and followed Harry’s lead completely” so I don’t think it’s unfair to say that she was optimistically expecting things to work out and likely would have focused on that optimism no matter what she was told.
No need to resent my comment. I think both Meg and Harry are blameless for what happened.
IMO it’s the kind of thing you won’t understand until you actually live through it. I’m sure Meghan prepared for negative coverage, and I’m sure Harry did the best he could to make her understand what it would be like — but the unrelenting, years-long smear campaign, aided by the royal family — against her was *unprecedented,* so there was literally no way Harry or anyone could have prepared her for it.
ETA @TheHench and @Sofia I didn’t see your comments until I’d already made mine, and we *all* used the word unprecedented. That’s what people really need to understand, especially Cambridge stans who insist that Kate was treated just as badly. No royal had been treated like that, ever. There was no way that ANYONE could have been prepared for that onslaught.
@Harper Although Meghan may have expected the press to be fair, that was already a very naive view. The press are not fair and they never have been. When you look at Diana, William, Harry and even celebs over the years, it’s never been fair. That’s not even just a British press thing.
It did grow into something else with Meghan, but as the documentary makes clear, there were a number of factors which contributed to that. Part was Harry’s refusal to engage and make good on that unspoken deal, and part was the fallout between the brothers, and the briefings that the press were getting from inside royal households. It snowballed out of control.
Not sure how Harry as a privileged white British prince could really prepare Meghan for the press’ racism & xenophobia. Plus the climate in Britain has really shifted since the EU referendum was called so Meghan was introduced in a more toxic anti ‘woke’, anti foreigner, anti immigrant, anti black climate than I’ve known in my lifetime. Don’t think it could have been anticipated that Meghan would become a face of a toxic culture war.
Meghan has also faced a smear campaign by all types of Britain’s media that is more similar to a politician. Look at the OTT reaction to Vogue. The campaign against her is really like how Jeremy Corbyn has been covered in Britain. Again no way they could have prepared for that- as a duchess she hasnt the power that this takedown would warrant.
I can imagine Meghan could guess there would be usual double standards & microaggressions as a WOC but if she did a good job & avoided Fergie or Sophie type scandals, that would help. I think Harry thought the family would have her back as they generally have had with other married ins (see the queen having a go at News of the world after Sophie’s sheikh sting). But instead doing a good job provoked the jealousy that gave the press the signal to go harder on Meghan as she was not protected. And the family abandoned her, started the smears pretty quickly after the wedding. Similar behaviour towards Fergie, Diana took a few years. And the press specifically gave Fergie a grace period when she was pregnant which never happened with Meghan
So again not something Harry/Meghan could have prepared for.
Harry never expected William and Kate to side with the press to go after his wife. I think that was his blind spot. Thankfully, he was aware enough to see the precedence in his own life experience as the spare and he knew Archie would be William and Kate’s next target. I think if Kate had been kind behind the scenes it would have made a difference in the support Meghan felt. Instead, Kate and CarolE were colluding with Camilla Tominey to scoop. If you see any part of the BBC special, watch the scene where Tominey is speaking about getting the story that Harry was dating Meghan. She is visibly euphoric to the point of weirdness.
Harry grew up in this life and so could not objectively “prepare” Meghan as you concede, but also I don’t think HE even knew how bad it would get. You don’t know what you don’t know, as they say — and while his previous relationships with Chelsy and Cressida got plenty of scrutiny, a relationship with an American woman of color is a whole other ball of wax that he simply had no clue about until he was in it. He’s the epitome of a white privileged male, albeit one that acknowledges and realizes his status and privilege now. At that point all he knew is he loved her and he would do anything to make it work — they were both going on their naivete and optimism and I truly don’t think he realized how diabolical the press and his family would ultimately be.
Rapunzel, Harry has been the victim of abuse from courtiers, his family, his brother, the staff, school administrators, and the tabloids his entire life.
As written all over this post, what was done to Meghan was unprecedended. Very odd stance to take, to constantly blame Harry for what happened.
I think what Harry underestimated was the degree of William’s envy and jealousy over him marrying a beautiful, accomplished woman who loved him, Will’s fury that he would no longer be able to control Harry and use him to hide his own do-nothingness – and the extent to which Will was prepared to work to destroy Harry’s happiness. Yes, multiple other factions failed Harry and Meghan, and worked against them for their own ends, but it’s KP that we’ve seen take a lead in the smear campaign, culminating most recently in JK working with the MOS.
That’s a betrayal beyond just the RF failing to be supportive. Harry had been dating women in the same aristo/adjacent milieu, and Will likely figured Harry was going to end up in the same situation as him, having to settle for someone as he settled for Kate. Instead, out of nowhere Harry snagged a gem, and when the pair immediately began overshadowing Will, the future heir, even before the marriage, it was off to the races for KP.
Was the problem the press, his family or both? His initial calculation probably included family support as is provided to the others.
I don’t get why SOME PEOPLE are digging in and insisting on blaming Harry for the cruel and racist treatment that was subjected to Meghan. It’s like KP insisting that both Meghan and Kate were (mis)treated equally and the same. How was Harry, a white prince who had never dated any POC supposed to know that his family was racist and would work with the equally racist BM to try and kill his black wife and unborn child? This sounds exactly like Meghan knew what she signed up for, non? When you read things like Meghan was too naive to not have known this would happen to her or Harry knew what would happen but chose not to tell Meghan for this or that reason, Harry was delusional for thinking his wife would be treated well, etc, I can’t help but wonder why exactly these BM talking points are being pushed on this site.
@BabsORIG I think that’s quite an extreme view. Nobody is pushing those talking points, they’re just looking at the situation. Meghan demonstrated her own naivety in the situation when she said she expected it to be fair. Harry knew from the start that it wasn’t going to be fair. What they did to his mother wasn’t fair. What they did to his exes wasn’t either, or even to him. History has shown us that they’d have the knives out and dig up any dirt they could lay their hands on, by any means necessary.
As someone else mentioned, Harry coming from his position of white privilege probably didn’t expect the racist tone it would take on, and he also probably didn’t stop to think that while it would be bad, how much worse it could get if he fell out with his family.
While I know that the result was Meghan feeling suicidal, I struggle to believe that William’s plan all along was to kill her or their child.
“While I know that the result was Meghan feeling suicidal, I struggle to believe that William’s plan all along was to kill her or their child.”
I am sure William did not wish to kill Meghan or her child. However, many regular posters of the Daily Fail commentariat and other SM sites (which I will not name as I do not want my comment deleted) did wish mortal harm to Meghan and the Sussex children and the sooner the better.
@windy river, agree. Summing it up, Harry met and married someone he loves, who also made him stronger for himself, not a trophy wife. Though she is prize in so many ways. That is what threatened Will & whoever. Harry, between his army experience/life outside palace walls and being with someone who wanted to him to be the best person for himself, threated the whole stanky dynamics of an out of date institution.
@Becks1 said:
“I do think its hard, like you said, to properly prepare someone for something that’s just been a part of your life for the entirety of it.”
I agree with you that Harry unavoidably had blind-spots about some things, having grown up in that toxic royal system. Still, Harry did try to protect and to prepare Meg in ways that he could. In fact, Harry writing and gaining permission to put out the press release warning the media to back-off (which also confirmed his relationship with Meghan) was an act of protection. It was also unprecedented, thus a huge clue that this relationship was serious.
On the day of the royal wedding, Tom Bradby (a wedding guest), was interviewed by ITV (the network he is employed by). In the brief interview on that shining, glorious day, Bradby mentioned how Harry had asked him to sit down with Meghan (during the height of interest in their relationship, right after their dating was publicly revealed). Meghan had trouble understanding why her dog walker was being harassed in Toronto. Bradby tried to explain, and to reassure Meghan.
Harry was obviously anxious about all of it, said Bradby. During the ITV interview, Bradby also commented how he felt Meghan was good for Harry, and that she’s a calm, kind, no-nonsense person (paraphrasing his words). The interview took place during ITV’s broadcast of the royal wedding — the ITV video of the wedding used to be up on YouTube, but I don’t think the full ITV broadcast is still there.
I believe that even Harry was not prepared for this malignant media campaign. He was used to the ‘normal’ range of abuse he had experienced during his life. Anticipating a deliberately planned and executed take down campaign against his wife from behind palace walls would have been beyond his thinking. Also in the throes of new love and adoring this person would have made it harder to perceive the dangers. He would have prepared her to the best of his knowledge and experience. You can’t prepared for something unprecedented.
I think that they probably thought she was pretty well prepared because she was in the Hollywood business. Even if she was not very well known yet she would have been around those people who had to deal with this on some level. Or known people who had made it to A list status.
She had been in the spotlight, had paparazzi photos taken, been on talk shows and had magazine shoots. So I bet she was used to and maybe even welcomed the attention at first. She was probably a lot more ready than most of us ever would have been.
As to 5, Meghan said friends told her the press would come at her so maybe Harry did also. It’s just hard to believe if your life hasn’t been scandalous that so much could be written negatively.
Think your second sentence is correct. Meghan herself said she didn’t expect royal life to be easy, but she expected it to be fair. I imagine that idea extended somewhat to media coverage as well, even if she’d been warned about the British press. She had confidence that how she had lived her life would matter. And it was never even a consideration, for the palaces or the press.
“It’s just hard to believe if your life hasn’t been scandalous that so much could be written negatively”
exactly this! who would think that negative articles could be written about you eating avocado toast for breakfast??
I’m not sure that anyone or anything could have prepared Meghan for the racism that she got thrown at her. There was no blueprint for a black, American married-in, and I think as bad as they thought it could get was nothing compared to what it actually became. I think we all knew it was gonna get rough, but straight out of Compton? Comparing a newborn baby to a chimp? Any normal, rational human being with a heart or soul never would’ve imagined press would actually go there.
L84Tea- also, any normal human would’ve assumed if the press did go there (chimp cartoon, etc) that the family would stand up for whatever member was maligned.
I think Meghan would have been able to cope with some of the media bias and intrusion if the royal family had been supportive in equal measure. They should have shut down the negative stories, showed public support towards Meghan and dealt with unauthorised briefings swiftly. But as it was, the calls were coming from inside the house. It was actually the BRF who were steering the hate campaign against her. Not even Harry could have prepared Meghan from that kind of backstabbing.
Exactly. I don’t like the “she wasn’t prepared by Harry” comments because, to me, it implies that the media would have played fair if given access. It also ignores the fact that the family was very much on it from the get go.
It’s not even about being naive or optimistic. Harry saw the protection Kate got and assumed his own wife would at least get a fraction of that.
@Myra MTE! H and M said “we left because of lack of support from the family/firm”. The media played a huge part but the main issue was the firm and its members backstabbing them.
Going by the documentary, I get the impression that the royals felt that they couldn’t protect Meghan. What they were explaining was that within this unspoken contact, you grant access and get favourable coverage.
Harry and Meghan from early on were attempting to restrict that access. If the firm had then backed them, it wouldn’t be long before the press was bringing them all down.
It demonstrated the level of power that the press have, when it comes to the royals. When you add in the fact that the brothers seemed to have fallen out early on in all of this, they had limited options. They could have played the game, played them at their own game, or left.
GraceB, it is clear the family protects QEII and Philip’s memory (covering his scandals), Charles, Camilla, Andrew, William, and Kate, her wiglest, and even her family. They CHOOSE not to protect Harry and Meghan. That is a choice.
Also, Meghan was getting unfavorable coverage from the get-go. She wasn’t given a chance to “grant access” in order to get favorable coverage. Saying she was from compton, Sarah Vine with her racist language, I think it was Seward or Junor or was it Vine again with the bit about meghan’s “exotic DNA.” Then consider the weaponizing of her father against her, the criticism of things like the cost of her dress in the engagement photos – by the time she married and officially became a working royal, the press was already set against her and she and harry had no incentive to play nice.
Saying “we’re going to say horrible things about you but we’ll stop if you’re nice to us, its your fault we say bad things, we have no choice, its just how it is” is just such an abusive tactic that it blows my mind.
Going by the documentary, it was said that despite not being given access, coverage of Meghan had stayed relatively positive (though with racial undertones) because of the Meghan mania. The floodgates were opened with stories about tiaragate, followed by the difficult duchess claims. These, they said, came from the palace and giving access to the media would not have stopped the negativity. It didn’t work for Diana or Fergie, it wouldn’t have worked for Meghan.
Exactly Becks 1. Harry/Meghan deciding Meghan wouldn’t meet the rota wasn’t done in a vacuum. Harry issued that statement in Nov 16 & they doubled down in pre wedding period with Meghan’s half siblings, paying people to lie about dating Meghan, & grooming her father, harassing her mother.
Then they held back the Thomas Markle pap pics until the week of the wedding for maximum damage. It was clear the press had her father surrounded and bugged in case she called/visited so they played a part in her having to end a relationship with her father (not that I’m letting him off the hook). They were looking to humiliate her from the start. During the court case it was claimed that they asked the press to lay off Meghan whilst she was pregnant but obviously they didn’t & I’m guessing that’s why her friends then went to speak out on the bullying to People. Why would they want to invite such people into their private space?
And really they claim to be journalists. As long as they have access to report on their events why it’s it accepted that not having an informal chat means they can do character assassination as an attempt to blackmail for more intimate access?
@GraceB – I think that granting access and protecting Meghan are two different things. They could have protected Meghan and continued to grant their own access for positive coverage. They didn’t do it because positive coverage for Meghan meant less or even negative coverage for the rest. Also, the RF actively briefed against Meghan, so that seems to go against the idea that they couldn’t protect her.
@Jane re: your original comment about the reporters. The PM’s sister was speaking coded language so, while she said she wouldn’t write what she did four years ago, she did the ” I guess I know now that my language was wrong according to woke snowflakes and I won’t make that mistake again” – in other words completely unrepentant. So none of them think they’re racist.
Jane I agree with you about almost all. Except the prime minister sister, ( I didn’t know she was his sister). Anyway. She is still not understanding of racism. She is just acting a part. If she understood. She would have issued an apology and not say crap like she couldn’t write like that now as she did 4 years ago like 4 years ago was the Middle Ages as far as racism is concerned. And your point 5. I think Harry never saw the need to deal with those rodents pretending to be journalists so he didn’t feel a need to prepare Meghan for them because he himself doesn’t want to deal with them so why should she? To this day by the end of part 1, these people that hate her are all still laying the blame solely at Meghan feet. Everything was just peachy and Rosey until Meghan came along. Also Camilla should look into some sort of treatment facility for her rage and hate towards a woman she doesn’t even know. I did like how the journalist stated the difference in Robert and Dan assessment of the tiara story. Dan is another one that needs intensive help
How was Harry going to know that his family was going to attack his wife and use the press to do it? There was no way to prepare Meghan for that situation.
Not to mention weaponizing her own father, to this day, against her. I think that, from Meghan’s POV, a people person who has always worked hard, she thought that any misgivings the family had would ease up when she showed them how hard she was willing to work and what she hoped to do with her charities, on the tours, etc. Combine that with anything that reminded them of Meghan’s celebrity life like the baby shower or the private jets and they were ready to go nuclear on her. That all had the effect of making the family more hostile because she was getting so much global media attention and leaving them in the dust. That is why they are still going after Harry and Meghan. No one in that family has a fraction of the charisma the Sussexes have.
It will never fail to amuse me that if William and the monarchy had just played the long game, hadn’t briefed against Meghan and actually just made her feel welcome NONE of this would be happening. This whole ‘crisis’ is completely self-inflicted and for that I will always laugh at these people.
Yes indeed
Yup. I believe we are watching the fall of the British monarchy in real time. They will ultimately lose the war, not one of military action, but of public relations. Has they been strategic and played the long game they could be enjoying a time of renewed and lasting popularity.
It is completely self-inflicted. There was no harm aligning yourself with a popular, compassionate sibling. Mad king indeed.
Most definitely. In attacking Meghan, they have revealed a really unpleasant side to royals that we had forgotten about. The irony here is that until then, William was just a boring, scandal-free royal. Now, we know that he is petty, jealous and racist, with a serious anger problem.
Very true, and it all boils down to jealousy. I think that Charles and the Queen especially are quietly furious with William.
“too often overblown and unfounded claims from unnamed sources are presented as facts and it is disappointing when anyone, including the BBC, gives them credibility.”
Let’s see- what specifically is overblown and unfounded? The fact that isn’t specified is telling. These people keep playing themselves.
And thinking about it, isn’t “overblown” an interesting word? Like, “so what we briefed against the Sussexes. You’re blowing it out of proportion!”
Oh and….I’ll bet this doc gets better ratings than Earthshot. Lolz.
A puppy taking a dump on live tv would get better ratings than Earthflop. It would be cuter than Will’s yellow toothed turtle headed self too.
That line sounds like an indictment on the press and RRs in general, not on this particular documentary which has actual reporters talking about their actual experiences, right?
If he doesn’t like “unnamed sources” then maybe he should have told his minions to stand down years ago.
Becks1- it says the BBC so they’re at least including the documentary, imo.
Ironically there is a story in the Sun this morning after the documentary that would have us believe that William never allows his staff to leak because of what he saw with Charles and Diana briefing against each other in the press.
Ironic just after a documentary which has the press specifically saying that he works with them. I mean, they literally just make it up as they go…
@Rapunzel – oh I know the actual quote is about the BBC and the documentary, but I’m saying considering that William’s team has been briefing against Harry for years now, it falls flat and doesn’t really make sense in this context of reporters saying they actually work with palace insiders.
I was so taken with this quote too! Um.. nowhere do they deny the accuracy of the BBC’s claims.
They just say that generally unnamed sources are used and they think it sucks. Lol.
How to say nothing while sounding like you’re saying something:
“ said: ‘A free, responsible and open Press is of vital importance to a healthy democracy. However, too often overblown and unfounded claims from unnamed sources are presented as facts and it is disappointing when anyone, including the BBC, gives them credibility.’
The Royal Family can’t complain about “too often overblown and unfounded claims from unnamed sources are presented as facts” when they never refuted these stories when they first came out. They never defended Meghan against the press attacks and most times were the source of the stories. I do expect part 2 to be attack Harry and Meghan but at least in part 1 we got to see the royal rota tell on themselves. The most amazing thing about this is that most of this documentary, was done last year before the Oprah interview so Harry and Meghan just confirmed everything the royal rota last night. I’ve noticed that the royal rota is very quiet on Twitter today…I wonder why?
The rota ain’t slick. You can tell they wanted to say what they said on that documentary for a long time now. They gotta keep up the facade for their jobs sake by playing the loyal correspondent to the palace but I’m sure there are some elation among them that this documentary was out. They’ve lost money, credibility etc and their golden geese. It was bound to happen and I’m sure it’ll be more Meghan and Harry bashing but at this point, it’s boring and isn’t making an impact anymore.
The one thing that stands out to me about the statement is that they could have done it at any time referring to Meghan being attacked and NEVER ONCE did. So why would they think putting out such a statement now without specifically saying the media should not have attacked Meghan makes any of them look good?
They never refuted the stories despite how many times H&M asked them to, specifically the bridesmaid tears story but I’m sure there were others.
Though the clips I saw on other websites did the 3 palaces no favors (they’re still petty, jealous and vindictive monsters after Diana’s passing), I don’t trust the BBC not to flip the script and go full attack on Meghan in the next part. Fuck that trifling royalist network.
I agree. The clips that I saw do not paint the 3 palaces in a good light at all, but I am still holding my breath. I’m fully expected H&M to get pummeled in the next segment. It seems too good to be true otherwise.
Maybe or maybe not because H&M won’t put out just a vague statement about lies they will dial their attorney.
Their shamelessness is dizzying. They so preciously protect their image of stoicism, yet run rampant with briefings and statements, feeling protected under the cloak of anonymity or the gravitas of the official letterhead. Why deny what’s so blatantly true?
Also, if they prepared this statement beforehand, I guess the BBC did concede and let them preview it.
@MariahLee, it’s unreal. It’s as if they keep telling us it’s sunny out when we can look right out our windows and see that it’s pouring rain.
The BRF seems to believe that they’re still so revered that people will accept anything they say, no matter how much proof there is to the contrary. Maybe that was true 100 years ago, but not anymore. They’re showing themselves to be the imbeciles we always knew they were.
I found a YouTube link and watched it. I wasn’t going to but then kept reading quotes and seeing clips online that had me interested. So far, it hasn’t bashed the sussexes. Fingers crossed. It’s interesting too in that I believe it was filmed before the Oprah interview.
It was mostly maddening to watch and hear these royal reporters. The glee from Whooton and Tominey was hard to stomach. They have to know they’re just tools used by KP but they’ve convinced themselves they are actual journalists. Tominey smiles/laughs/smirks when asked if she gave the palace a right to reply when breaking the Meghan is Harry’s secret girlfriend story. She did not. Whooton brags about how he’s a NZ outsider who was brave enough to break tiaragate. Really vile. It definitely makes you want to take a shower after watching.
That’s what has always kinda made me laugh: the royal reporters all seem to believe that they’re on the same level as actual journalists. I would love to put them in a room with like. a bunch of war reporters and watch them try to tell their own “war stories” about tiaras.
Oh but they would try and would truly believe they’d done a great job. I wonder if you cover people who completely lack self awareness for so long that you start to emulate that lack of self awareness. Bc some of these royal reporters act like they’re royal themselves, full of ego, self-delusion, and illusions of grandeur.
Worse – I suspect they like to think they are on the same level or closely adjacent to, the Royals themselves. Camilla, Dan et al see themselves as ‘royal insiders’ with Wootton, in particular, taking that to the nth degree by effectively telling William what he should be doing or not doing in some articles.
I guess, for the RR to continue to feel important they have to believe the monarchy is also important but there have been cracks recently, thanks to KP’s arrogance and stupidity. The editor of The Mail undertook a multi-million £ court case on the say so of a senior insider – all clues pointing to William himself on that one – only to find out that Wills had actually given him a bum steer and they lost the case. It reminds me of how Camilla Tominey doubled down on the “NO, Meghan made Kate cry” story post Oprah because that is what she’d been told most likely by Kate or Carole themselves. But once they start to realise that Will and Kate have and will lie to them – what then? If you are a RR with all that secret, dirty laundry and the contract is access for your silence/good coverage, what might you do when you are presented with mounting evidence that the Heir to the throne will blatantly feed you false stories?
You are right, The Hench. Walmart and K-Mart have proved to be completely unreliable. They will never be forgiven for that. The tabloids / RR will find a way to get their revenge when it suits them and their masters.
Must have been filmed some time back since “tiaragate” has now been debunked.
Which makes it even funnier when Whooton is going on about how only he could have told the truth about tiaragate bc he’s not a part of the system.
So for me with something like “tiaragate” there’s a couple different ways to look at it. We know that the story as told by Dan W never happened.
But did Dan W just completely make it up? That seems like a random story to just make up, but Dan W is pretty extreme and hates Meghan so I wouldn’t put it beyond him.
Or, what I think is more likely, the story was fed to him – so while the story was false, its still worth looking at who fed him that particular story. If we think that he wasn’t just making it up out of the air, then he got it from somewhere, and its even more disturbing IMO if someone fed him a completely false story just to hurt Meghan. So I think its interesting that it was discussed in the documentary, if you look at it from that angle.
That’s the thing @becks1. I don’t think Whooton or Tominey made this stuff up but were fed these lies, which is horrifying, especially if it came from family. But at what point, do they realize they were fed lies? Surely, they must, at this point? Are they just so hooked on getting their exclusive details that they don’t care whether it’s lies or are they actively creating a dream world in which they are journalists doing a public duty by revealing these details?
I feel like maybe I’m giving these people too much energy but it’s just shocking to witness.
@hench- I mean I hope one finally just reveals it all but being fed false stories still pays the bills yeah?
@Jais – thought provoking question. Yes, if you are CT or Wootton, do you accept being fed false stories on the basis that they do sell?
I’d say no on balance and for the following reasons:
1. Irrespective of our views, they see themselves as ‘proper’ journalists and much of their ego is based on knowing what others don’t.
2. You can’t be seen as an ‘insider’ if all your ‘inside info’ turns out to be b0ll0cks.
3. If they run a false story then they end up looking like idiots when the truth comes out.
4. Moreover, they open themselves up to lawsuits – as the Mail case has just beautifully demonstrated. When your employer loses millions because of a story you wrote, it’s not a great career move.
5. Negative stories about Meghan cannot sustain the tabloids for ever. Wills has got nothing left to feed and US outlets are getting the new scoops.
6. Last but not least you are sitting on some absolute golden scoops (like Rose Hanbury/manipulation of Toxic Tom/the real state of the Cambridge marriage/the real source of the Middleton income) in return for access – and you are starting to realise that William has farted all over his end of the deal.
If it was filmed recently though, I would hope that somebody would have called him out about the story being false. Maybe in the next segment?
@hench, these are very convincing arguments as to why one of these reporters might turn. But then how far might they turn is the question? Subtle shade that possibly keeps the flow of information still coming. That seems kind of where they’re at now but may I live to see when they really reveal stuff.
@Jais – oh, yes, me too. I really, really hope they turn!
Both Kate and Sophie have been cozying up to AK47 for years. No surprise if tiaragate was started by one of them via Kelly. Plus we’ve had multiple stories of William demanding Meghan have no access to royal jewels or Diana’s jewels.
@Jais and @Hench – I think what may make one of the reporters turn is looking stupid on an international stage. Camilla tominey was the one with the crying-at-the-dress-fitting story, and she could not answer for why she got the story completely wrong. She looked stupid and incompetent and the world was watching at that point, after Oprah. (I think that’s part of the reason she hates Meghan so much, Meghan specifically called out her story as being a lie.)
Obviously CT is still a RR and still doing the cambridge’s dirty work for them, so she’s not a good example, but more keep getting exposed for running lies as truth, so at some point I think one of them will get tired of it.
And as pointed out above, these are not real reporters. Do we think they are double and triple checking their stories? My guess is Carole or Kate called Camilla and told her about the dress fitting and the tears, Camilla asked the other one (so Carole called, then camilla asked Kate or her spokesperson if that was true) and that was enough for her. If your source for these stories is the duchess of cambridge or the Duke of Cambridge (and the FFK), why would you really double-check? Except that you can’t say they’re your source. But hey, you get the clicks and you get the ad revenue so who cares.
Anyway, I’m still waiting for Emily Andrews’ tell-all. Not because she’s so pro-Meghan, but because I think she hates Dan Wootton and I think she would tell everything to bring him down.
@Becks1 – yes, this is exactly why what William is doing is so potentially risky. The Royal Reporters – up until now – have taken the direct word of a royal to be gospel. Why would they need to fact check something from someone so senior and in the know and the future future king? The DM WENT TO COURT on William’s word against Meghan’s. To date that has been the contract. Camilla T did look like an idiot on TV but she also looked like a rabbit in the headlights because what we were watching in real time was a woman who was just beginning to realise that someone she had entirely trusted, whom her professional reputation and ability to get good stories rests on, whom she probably thought she had a “relationship” with had lied to her. When journalists like her start to look around and realise that dressgate or tiaragate are not one-off misunderstandings but W&K deliberately feeding misinformation on a sustained basis out of jealousy and pettiness – what do they do with all those true scoops they’ve been sitting on as their end of the bargain?
@Hench, you have hit on some seriously juicy questions. I never thought about it from that angle-&K feeding deliberate false stories. You’re right, these RR’s have staked their reputations on WK’s words and are looking like fools when it blows up in their face. When are these RR’s going to wake up and pull the carpet out from under the Cams??
They all look stupid. November 2018 was the month of-Toubatti quitting(she was fired), Meghan made Kate cry(the opposite happened(receipts) and tiara gate (emails show otherwise). All this supports a smear campaign against Meghan. Effin Newsweek (really wish Christopher Bouzy wasn’t sharing their stuff-hope that’s not the outlet he’s working with. Big. Huge. Mistake), recently said that Knauf’s email was sent sent after the Oceania 2018 tour. Unless, I missed something, no specific date was shown for the October 2018 email. Bueller?
can you send me a link? i want to watch it too.
Watching it right now! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEGQse3xPks
I saw a link to it on youtube, so i watched it. https://youtu.be/eEGQse3xPks
It was kind of interesting. the BM saying its Harry’s fault for not formerly introducing Meghan to the press, and His statement knocking his dad off the front page LOL
I love when Charles complains about not being on the front page or whatever. You weren’t going to be on the front page anyway! The Queen missed Remembrance Sunday and Charles was there and Kate was still the one taking up half the front page of all the tabloids, not Charles, not Camilla, etc. Did anyone in the UK care that Charles was on tour last week, or where he went?
@Becks1 Rhiannon also points out C’s jealousy when recounting how he wouldn’t answer her questions about W & H being potentially involved in one of his projects. I loved that two RR were prepared to confirm how childishly jealous C is of his sons.
Chuck was also childishly jealous of Diana. The ironic thing is, she actually made him more interesting because it was amazing that someone so young, pretty, and most of all charismatic and caring married him and was obviously infatuated with him. He just did not have the ‘it’ factor nor did he actually do anything to make him interesting. The attention he got in the press was driven solely by his rank, and if he’d been anyone other than Betty’s first born son, no one outside of his aristo circle would have given two s***s about him. Diana made him look better by association, but he was so puffed up and filled with self-importance that he didn’t see that.
@TigerMcQueen – agree about Charles’ childish jealousy of Diana. Always reminds me, as a contrast, of the famous JFK quote – “I’m the man who accompanied Jacqueline Kennedy to Paris”. Diana definitely upped the interest in Charles, most specifically on the international stage, and if he’d been smart, he would have found a way to capitalize on that.
But – while it’s hard to fathom, now that Charles seems like such an old fogey – when he was young he got plenty of his own attention. Not exactly handsome, he was good looking enough, well put together, and a very sharp dresser. Skier, polo player. Did interesting overseas tours. And the Prince’s Trust concerts starting in the 1980’s were a very big deal, attracting most of the top names at the time. 30-40 years ago, when TQ and Philip were younger and their children were settling into their adult lives, the family commanded a level of interest that’s been missing for a long time.
73 isn’t all that old anymore, and I’m puzzled how/why Charles has turned into such a stick in the mud. The jealousy, apparently, is one thing that’s remained, and the whole saga around Meghan is so very comparable to what happened with Diana, it pathetically illustrated, none of them have learned one da*n thing.
Thanks for the link!
It was very interesting and balanced.
And it was obvious why there were so many negative articles in the days coming up to the documentary – I could see how mentioning work-shy Wills could send him into a purple-faced fit of rage, also the part where it was said that Harry sells more papers.
It was not too flattering for Harry as well, as it highlihted his bad temper.
Overall, it was a good watch, I hope to see part 2.
Hmmm….are we sure it was Charles being jealous and knocked off the front page? His Middle East tour started on the 5th of November. He had days of headline opportunities before Harry’s Nov. 9th statement. Now, Will, on the otherhand..his schedule for that time was:
Nov.10th-Laying flowers @ Willesden Park, visit Kensington Memorial Park-give speech, fundraiser @ Kensington Palace for Centrepoint-give speech
Nov.11th-Host Investiture at Buckingham Palace
Now I’m sure *cough* that the RR’s were just waiting on tenterhooks for important & inspirational words to come out of Will’s mouth.
I guess they’re trying to say that Will doing anything while Charles is on tour would never be overshadowing to Charles. But, Harry putting out a statement to the degenerate, racist British media to leave his girlfriend alone, will overshadow them all? It actually is probably true. It’s not Harry & Meghan’s fault they’re more charismatic & interesting.
I’m still holding my breath. As I said yesterday, it’s the BBC and they’re never going to go too hard on the royals (even if they throw shots at them every so often, which they apparently did in the doc). I’m going to wait for the next part to come out because I imagine that’ll be less… than yesterday’s episode. And I didn’t watch the episode but from the people who did, it seemed that there was a “Well it’s all Meghan’s fault she didn’t see us” and there was some victim-blaming going around. And the BBC put this on BBCTWO and not BBCONE which is their main channel so they’re not fully promoting this.
As for “unnamed sources” and all that, all I can say is LOOOOOOOOL
The victim blaming of Meghan by the press may work in the UK, but I don’t see how it will convince people abroad, or at least in the US. “If you only met with us journalists, we’d would have been nice, but since not, you get negative press.” Then stories about avocados and other things that are so stupid or trivial, most Americans couldn’t compute IF they even paid attention. I mean, if that is journalism how works here in the US, they wouldn’t say it out loud on national TV.
William let’s it be known to a grateful nation that he does not leak or let servants leak.
Remind me how Jason Knauf, VOLUNTEERED to help tabloids case against his boss’s sister in law? Yes we are very much NOT a leaking family!
All of this solidifies why Harry got his family the HELL outta dodge and unlike his FATHER…paid attention to his Wife’s mental health and realized it was on HIM to protect her and his children & acted accordingly….that is the ONE THING this hellscape is consistently proving🤬
Unnamed sources? They apparently interviewed several of the royal rota and the investigator who tried to get dirt on Harry’s girlfriends. That’s hardly anonymous.
And there are plenty of “highly placed” palace sources in a lot of the commentary on so-called “megxit”, plus outright authorizing the release of Meghan’s private emails and texts, so they can spare me the concern.
Well said.
Not correcting lies is one thing. But the BRF couldn’t be bothered to call out stuff like the chimp cartoon of Archie. That was not an overblown, unsubstantiated story. It was just cruel. And the fact that nobody called out that cruelty (or nobody was allowed to) is more disturbing than anything.
Did the documentary touch on this?
Did this statement say they and their staff did not brief against Harry and Meghan? No, just more of claiming to be a victim, boo hoo, poor me.
Everyone of these hacks need to be hounded until they do reveal their sources by name.
Still waiting for the BM to apologize to Meghan……
The BM and the Royal Family who failed her, because they are one and the same.
I don’t think it matters what Meghan did because she wasn’t welcomed from the start. Remember Dickie Arbiter’s “it’s just a fling” statement when it was announced they were dating, he was already hearing the rejection from inside of the Palaces and likely knew that the savaging was going to begin to be rid of her.
Now we know that Knauf had permission to use Thomas Markle as a tool to sabotage the wedding and it didn’t work. So they thought that things would quiet down once they were married & they could silence them BUT they didn’t count on Meghan being a workhorse who has a magical touch with all her projects.
Imagine they were trying to kill this woman while she helped produce a bestselling cookbook for Grenfell survivors, a best selling magazine issue, a best selling capsule collection for women going back into the workforce and on and on and on. It made them look absolutely useless, undeserving of their tax payer money as well as overshadowed their boring events and causes.
So they decided to destroy her via the press not thinking that Harry would ever stand up for her and now they’re stuck with the blood thirsty press sharks they fed with smears. I hope they’re eaten alive one front page at a time.
Love your last sentence, Crowned Huntress. I’m gonna ask Santa to make it come true.
Hopefully all of the people who were scolding anyone here who wanted to watch it in the post from the other day because “the squad” said so, before it even aired, will think twice next time before sanctimoniously telling other posters here what to think & say & watch.
I watched it, I didn’t plan to but then I changed my mind. And things I had confirmed to me were 1– Carole and Kate or one of the other were the ones that definitely brief to Camilla about Harry and Meghan relationship and all the other nasty things she continued to write and say about them. Second, the more her and Robert and all the rest try to deny that they didn’t notice Meghan color when reporting about her, the more you know they absolutely went after her mostly for being black and marrying into their precious white Royals
Yeah, “I don’t see colour, I’m the least racist person ever” is a refrain we often hear from racists. Even if they themselves don’t recognize or name it as such.
The glee with which Harry’s family and their media cronies needed Meghan to be “put in her place” is sickening, as is the fact that the attacks became way more desperate once she got pregnant.
Does anyone know where Americans can watch this? Is it free?
Steph, follow the YouTube link posted up thread. I watched it last night.
Thank you
I watched it on YouTube, there is a link someone posted up above in the comments
Thank you
I am sure Queeny will get the BBC to drop the ghastly documentary and show 70 glorious years instead.
They really must think public are stupid: both Government or Crown or any institution protect, spin and leak. Okay TQ is head of Church of England and there is a heavy love thy neighbour vibe attached but there is malice in the palace.
They are in for a big surprise when TQ goes to heaven and discovers God really does do equality. Also Charles and Andrews financial shenanigans apart from paedo or pizza maybe explored in us civil trial. Really William did not need to add to mess with his servant volunteering to help tabs with its case against Meghan but none of them are bright, are they?
I see them as a dusty relic from colonial days but certain sections of society really want a knighthood or dame hood!
Do so doh like so….an old Trini saying that’s so true of William and the Royals. It was fine when the leaking hurt Meghan & Harry but now it’s shining a light on them, they don’t like it. Tough!
As I read all the drama surrounding the BBC documentary the words “clean up in aisle 3 ” comes to mind. Willyboy is working overtime doing damage control with the queen and Chaz having to chime in. Still unless my girl ,Meghan is involved don’t really care about the remainders.
You guys no wonder the palaces are angry Rajan is clearly not pro royals https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEGQse3xPks I think he aims to be balanced there are many swipes at the palace in this documentary
Most regular people (who are not keeping up with the royal drama) are rolling their eyes asking which group of rich, powerful millionaires living in mansions us commoners need to feel sorry for now. I’m so over all this royal bs.
However privileged they are, there are people who wield the power of the establishment to harass people to death. Princess Diana was privileged, and hounded to her death.
Well said, Ennie! It’s easy to look at this and say “she’s a millionaire, why should I care?”. But I honestly believe that everyone should care that an entire country’s media is being used to malign and basically try to destroy the reputation of one single woman. Because these same tactics will be used again and again.
And yet, you seek out info in these royals, and commented on this thread. You’re not as above it all as you’d like everyone to believe.
I loath the royals but I post on nearly every article here because the more we can get the truth out about how loathsome they and the BM are the better.
You can also see what happens in some of the Arab countries where monarchies are practically absolute. Princess Haya’s situation in the Emirates and how she had to flee with her children, or what happened to Kako and Masako in Japan. Women in particular have a lot to lose, and all the former also were part of royal families.
The monarchy is starting to look more and more like a really expensive reality show. As an American, I’ve never before given a lot of thought to whether it should or should not exist, but now I think if I was a UK citizen and I was paying for this crap I’d be furious.
KP, CH and BP are really going full on clown, I see.
Dear Jenny Afia,
Burn. It. Down.
+1000
They sent the statement to the BBC before they saw the documentary? Will they never learn?
Does anyone have the link to the documentary
I just finished watching via a YouTube link somewhere in this thread. It’s definitely worth a click.
I thought the documentary was interesting–if only because it’s one of the few documentaries I’ve seen that sort of explains the relationship between the RF and the press. I saw the other day that somebody at KP dismissed the documentary as “tittle-tattle” and imo that word crystalized what has gone wrong with the RF. Because I couldn’t imagine any other major press office (#10, the White House, even my local gov or mayor or Congressman or NFL team) using such an old-fashioned term to try to get their point across in 2021. Which is to say, I think having the queen in place for so long has pretty much stagnated the entire family and keeps the entire operation locked into the Edwardian era. There’s no way forward in the long-term if your media strategy was developed before WW2.
The wonderful ‘Christmas Carol Service’ planned by the Cambridge’s including the kids has now been ‘given to ITV as a punishment’ what a POS! You are ‘Wills’ Wouldn’t have watched it anyway!
ITV, who used to hire PMorgana
How much promotion has William provided to this documentary by his own actions? He’s clearly unaware of the Streisand effect. And this overreaction keeps this story in the press longer than it might have otherwise been.
Camilla said that they the media were hearing stories that all was not well in the palaces and normally everything is level so she needed to investigate further. Okay, let’s say we believe that bullshit, how come during your investigation the only person you could find guilty of the wrong doings is Meghan. How come you couldn’t be bothered to do your investigation into the making Kate cry story before you wrote and ran it? This woman is Such a hateful evil racist bitter Betty.
As always, I do want to contextualize William’s behaviour here with waging war on the BBC, and the larger political implications of what that means in Britain right now. The BBC, in spite of it’s intense right-wing and partisan turn in the last few years, is the subject of ire from a lot of the Little England, Tory-voting, Brexit-supporting racist crowd. They are the loudest voices that keep bleating abt how the BBC is full to the hilt of bolshie extreme leftists who are biased against the govt for the miniscule amount of work it does in aiming to represent the news fairly. It’s especially hilarious and ironic for them to say this bc the BBC has never been more openly biased and in favour of the Tory right-wing as they are right now. They’ve always trended towards being that way, but it was always kept hushed up so that the image of staid neutrality isn’t tarnished.
But like I said, it’s been a canard on the British right-wing for a while now. William, as I’ve mentioned time and again, is pretty blatant in his political leanings. He hires former Tory party staffers for his own personal staff, establishes relationships with the political journalists over at the Times (who all lean Tory btw), and in general, is reputed to be fairly reactionary behind closed doors. This is the second time that he’s been so stingingly critical of the BBC, the first one being the whole Diana interview thing.
And now this. I don’t deny that William is infuriated out of sheer entitlement alone. How DARE the BBC not toe his line the moment he threw a tantrum about this? He’s the future future king after all. But I also think, the reason he’s going so damn hard against the BBC in the first place is bc he’s not a fan, for precisely the reasons I outlined above. I said in my comment yesterday, I do think William rants and raves about how the BBC is full of “woke commie lefties”, and how dare they insinuate that HE, who comes from the family who is very much NOT RACIST THANK YOU, briefed the racist British tabloid press against his black, biracial, American sister-in-law, all to cover up his pathetic affairs with the wives of the local posh toff crowd.
I also do not think it’s any type of coincidence that the people in the BBC who William seems to have the deepest ire for both happen to be men of colour. I think in his brain, he sees it as the woke POCs have it in for him, which is fairly typical for a racist white British man of his type to believe. It probably confirms to him what he likely already believes to be the case with the BBC, that again, it’s full of woke commie lefties who hate white people and the Tory party.
But what I really do wonder is, how much more will it take for people to start waking up and becoming truly alarmed at the manner in which the future future King is conducting himself when it comes to unfavourable press coverage of himself and his actions? By the abject lack of outrage, it feels to me like the British people are perfectly okay with an unelected official going around using tax payer money to threaten legal action against a free press, any time they say something bad about him. Again, I want to remind everyone that he got the Tatler to rescind portions of its article, successfully. Is that not censorship? Where’s the hue and cry about free speech?
I always warn people in my comments that it’s not Charles who’s the problem. It’s William. And William is not a danger to the British monarchy as much as he, and the system that coddles and enables him, are a danger to democracy. He’s not going to straighten himself out and deal with the various ups and downs of being a monarch with the sort of stoicism that made the Queen so popular, and he is not even marginally liberal-leaning in his inclinations like Charles is. He’s an angry reactionary whose knee jerk response is to always reach for the biggest guns possible when it comes to stuff like this. And again, how long is it going to take for the British people to realize just how fcked up all of this really is?
Charles is still the problem and the QUeen, they could have reined in William but chose not to and chose to watch the way he treated Harry doing nothing to stop it.
Reports are coming out on Twitter that the BBC actually turned down Keen’s concert. Ha! So KP is lying again.
Prince Wiliam’s new PR team are aggressively attacking the BBC. It’s well known that the UK Tory government want to privatise the BBC. Prince William has a number of Tory members as his staff including William Hague and they seem to be quite happy undermining Charles, BBC and whoever gets in their way. Prince William has messed things up badly and is using his new team to attack anyone who undermines him way. Quite disturbing really – he is out of control. He really seems to have a lot to hide.
I do wonder if this is the beginning of a sea change in royal coverage by the BBC. The queen is in poor health and there is clear evidence of the palace purposely misleading them about her issues.
There was also significant public backlash to the nonstop coverage of the death of prince Philip. I wonder if the public has moved on and the press are starting to figure it out. They expected mass mourning with prince Philip and instead people were upset that they cancelled the other shows.
The queen is still very popular and people have a large amount of respect for her. I honestly think it is now in large part just for her longevity and the stability that she projects. When she passes the coverage will be over the top and I wouldn’t be surprised if people don’t get irritated at that as well. She is a symbol but her passing won’t be a shock or a tragedy. I don’t think however that there will be the same public outpouring of grief like there was for princess Diana. Who was young, beautiful, interesting and left two handsome young boys. The queens children are almost all problematic, her grandchildren are grown and the great grandchildren are the cute photogenic ones. But it won’t be tragic. And therefore not as interesting.
Prince Charles is not charming, handsome or interesting and just in general unlikable. I don’t think that aura of the queen will cover him for too long after she passes.
Will is sullen, rude and in general unpleasant to look at. If he shows up to anything. The most interesting thing about his wife are her (poor) clothing choices. The kids are cute but they have restricted their media interaction and the press generally does not make money off of the photos that Kate holds the copyright to and releases on social media. As a couple they are not magnetic and since they do not like their jobs or the people they are forced to interact with it shows on their faces.
Many of the Royal Rota were so racist and snobbish that they just could not believe that an upstart mixed race American could ever dare steal the spotlight from the blood born royal family. Or a perfect English Rose. They were horrified and reacted badly. They are still acting badly and they managed to bully her out of the country and she took with her the most popular younger royal and the only one in the family that has the charisma and work ethic to do anything impactful. As an American I am happy to have them back.
Maybe now they are realizing the loss and know that they will be stuck with boring Charles and Camilla and sullen workshy Will. All the while Harry and Meghan have done so much while having young children during a pandemic. Their achievements are impressive under any metric but even when you are grading against the royal curve that they give to the heirs- they outscore them completely.
This whole situation with the documentary is suspicious. What’s going on behind the scenes? Why did the BBC broadcast this documentary now when it was done last year? Why did the royals react so aggressively with a rare joint statement from all the palaces together against the BBC?
My theory is that this is part of the endgame I predicted earlier between the Windsors and Boris Johnson who in my opinion wants to be the first president of the UK in the post-Elizabethan era. Therefore he will oppose Charles and William.
First of all in January 2021 Boris appointed his friend and big Tory donor Richard Sharp as the new chairman of the BBC, making it more government friendly and less critical towards Boris.
In April 2021 Prince Philip died. Surprisingly Boris did not attend the funeral with the excuse “he gave up his seat to make room for family” and 10 days after the burial Boris appointed William’s personal secretary Simon Case (who helped William exile H&M) as his top chief of the civil service (the youngest ever at 42), probably to tap all of William’s dirty secrets to use against him at a later stage. William stupidly thought Boris’ was his friend and would help him to be the next King instead of Charles.
Meanwhile republican and producer Amol Rajan gets permission to finish his documentary in which a significant number of royal rota are spilling the beans about the leaking of the palaces against H&M. Deliberately breaking the invisible contract. In my conspiracy theory the focus on H&M’s story in this documentary is just a distraction to cover up this real war for power between Boris in collaboration with the press against the weakened Windsors (Andrew’s lawsuit, Charles’ title for cash scheme).
Why this timing of the documentary launch? Because the Queen’s health has worsened making a transition to a regency imminent, meaning a strengthened position for William and Charles. Not in Boris’ interest.
To conclude: it’s interesting to see that the day after the airing of the documentary Boris went to the theater to watch a performance of Macbeth (again drawing attention to himself for not wearing the prescribed face mask; he just loves breaking the rules). Could the play contain his hidden message?
Macbeth Summary. Three witches tell the Scottish general Macbeth that he will be King of Scotland. Encouraged by his wife, Macbeth kills the king, becomes the new king, and kills more people out of paranoia. Civil war erupts to overthrow Macbeth, resulting in more death.
By now I think William is aware of the game and the mess he has created. He enabled his enemies by weakening the Windsors, exiling H&M instead of strengthening them with the Fab Four-model. Now it’s Charles and him against the powerhungry establishment.